Every Story Has To End
by kalijahrulez
Summary: "She tries to let go of the past, but there is so much she doesn't want to forget. So many memories that make her both smile and cry. She has lost everything. Every single person she has ever loved is either dead or hates her. Everyone thinks she's just a lost cause. And she thinks maybe they're right." Katherine's final moments. Set five years after her break up with Elijah.


Five years. Five long, miserable years. That's how long it's been since he let her go. Since he watched her walk away and didn't stop her. A lot has changed in those few years. But a lot has also stayed the same. She isn't quite Katherine anymore, but she still isn't Katerina. She isn't really sure who she is these days. Since the night Elijah gave up on her, she has been completely and utterly lost. She tells herself to move on, but it's easier said than done. She tries to let go of the past, but there is so much she doesn't want to forget. So many memories that make her both smile and cry. Memories of better, easier days. But even the best memories bring her down, because she knows there won't be more like them. She has lost everything. Every single person she has ever loved is either dead or hates her. Everyone thinks she's just a lost cause. And she thinks maybe they're right. Maybe she's just no good. If Elijah, the one person who knows her better than anyone, can't see that she's capable of being saved, then maybe she really is a lost cause. Every time she thinks that maybe, just maybe, she can be happy, life tends to slap her in the face. She is reminded of all the horrible things she has done, of the person she has become, and she is left alone. No one understands. No one feels her pain. No one sees the brokenness in her eyes. No one cares anymore. They have their own lives, and she isn't important. The only hope she had left was Elijah. He brought out the humanity in her. When she was with him, she felt less like the monster she has become, and more like that wide-eyed girl from 1492. But as always, it was too good to be true. Even he decided that she wasn't worth it.

As she walks down the dirt path that leads to a single gravestone, she lets a tear fall. This is the first time since Elijah left her that she allows herself to be weak. She approaches the five-hundred year old stone and drops to her knees. She stares at it and reaches a trembling hand out to trace what used to be words. Time and harsh weather conditions have taken their toll on the stone, but she knows what it says. _Хере лис Александра Рая Добрев: Хонест вифе, девотед мотхер, царинг даугхтер, ловинг систър 1492 - 1562_ (_Here Lies Aleksandra Raya Dobrev: Honest wife, devoted mother, caring daughter, loving sister 1492 - 1562_). She smiles as she thinks about the beautiful soul that was laid to rest here. Buried in the ground beneath her is her daughter. Her eyes water and after a couple minutes of trying to hold back the tears, she gives in. She lets them flow from her eyes until there are no more. Even now, five-hundred years later, she remembers. She remembers every last detail of the magnificent woman that was Aleksandra. She remembers lurking in the shadows, watching her baby girl grow up from the sidelines. She could never bring herself to disturb Aleksandra's perfect life. But that doesn't mean she simply just watched. She made damn sure that her little girl had everything she would ever need. And after seventy years, five beautiful children, twenty-three grandchildren, and a blissful life of love and happiness she watched from outside a window as her darling Aleksandra took her last breath. That was the moment Katherine Pierce was born, and this is the moment she dies. She looks up at the sky as the sun is about to rise. She removes her daylight jewelry and takes a deep breath. In a single moment her entire life flashes before her eyes.

_"Let me hold her, just once. Mama, please!"_

_"You're supposed to catch me. You're meant to catch me."_

_"__True love is not real unless it is returned." _

_"Life is too cruel. If we cease to believe in love, why would we want to live?"_

_"Better you die than I."_

_"Mama! No, mama, no..."_

_"Please, call me Katherine."_

_"The vampires are my family, I won't let anything happen to us."_

_"I love you, Stefan. We will be together again, I promise."_

_"I never loved you, Damon. It was always Stefan."_

_"That sounds like the beginning of a love story, Stefan, not the end of one."_

_"Elijah!"_

_"Humanity is a vampire's greatest weakness. No matter how easy it is to turn it off, it just keeps trying to fight it's way back in. Sometimes I let it."_

_"Did it ever occur to you that maybe you don't know me at all?"_

_"You're giving me a second chance now when no one else will."_

_"I love you, Elijah."_

_"I meant what I said about my feelings for you, and I'd like to think that you feel something for me, too."_

_"I'm gonna let you decide where we go from here."_

She sees the first ray of light awaken. She closes her eyes and loses herself in the memories. She feels the warmth of the sun, followed by the burning. She hears herself screaming, smells the burning of her flesh. But somehow, the pain is second on her mind. She wonders briefly if anyone is going to miss her, if anyone is going to care. She pushes the thought away and focuses on what her death means. After five-hundred years, this is how it ends. After five-hundred years of being hunted and escaping death repeatedly, this is how her story ends. No one ever had what it took to defeat her. Though many have come close, none have been able to kill her. In the end, it is by her own hand that her life comes to a stop. Images of her daughter, her mother, her sister, Lucy, Isobel, Elijah, Anna, Harper, Stefan, Pearl, Damon, and all the others she has loved and lost flash through her mind. She feels them fading away as she is consumed by the flames. Finally, she feels nothing, and just like that, she ceases to exist. No one learns of her death. How could they when she has made it a point to avoid people? Everyone goes on with their lives, not knowing the fate that has fallen upon Katerina, or Katherine. They will live on and she will become a distant memory, but she will never be forgotten. She lived a long life, she loved and lost more than anyone ever should, she survived when all odds were against her, and she managed to pick herself up and dust herself off every time life thought it had beat her, but every story has to end.

**Okay, so I have no idea why I wrote this. It sorta just came to me while I was watching American Gothic tonight. Anyway, please review. (:**


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